Encountering America

November 5, 2012
Rising out of the tumultuous political and cultural climate of the 1960s, humanistic psychology, an approach centered on self-actualization, burst onto the scene in the latter part of the decade; the charge was led by psychologists Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers, and though the movement sharply declined at the end of the 1970s, Grogan, an American studies scholar, shows that it had a dynamic effect on its cultural moment. As the concept gained momentum, it broadened to include not just the individual but the community as well, culminating in Esalen, a free-thinking enclave on the Pacific coast whose ethos embraced encounter groups, an approach intended to help individuals work through issues, connect with others, and engage in productive introspection, but which soon morphed into a means to feed one's ego at the expense of others with the expectation of self-actualization in a weekend's time. Grogan insists that the era of humanistic psychology has had a profound impact on the American psyche, even as Rogers acknowledged in 1986 that "a lot of the kooky aspects... have fallen by the wayside." Spot-on reporting, an unbiased presentation, and an admirable attention to detail make this a valuable resource for psychologists and scholars of American counterculture movements.

November 15, 2012
Grogan reveals the seminal, but frequently overlooked, influence of the postwar humanistic psychology movement in creating what is sometimes described as today's "therapy culture," which includes employee retreats, seminars on sensitivity training, the proliferation of support groups and more. The author traces the movement back to the enhanced role of psychologists during and after World War II, when they worked with the military to profile recruits and deal with problems faced by veterans. They were unwilling to take a back seat to Freudian psychoanalysts, who dominated the practice of psychotherapy, and the empirical behaviorists, who were hegemonic in academic psychology. Pioneers in the field of humanist psychology, such as Abraham Maslow, advocated an alternative approach that was "oriented around ideas of personal growth and the infusion of values" into therapy. Grogan shows how the perception of alienation in the social climate of the 1950s, as exemplified by David Riesman's widely read The Lonely Crowd, supported their critique. At the same time, Carl Rogers revolutionized the practice of nondirective therapy by engaging in a dialogue with patients that emphasized their ability to achieve personal growth. The influence of the movement was enhanced in the '60s when humanist psychologists initially joined Timothy Leary in endorsing the use of LSD, the encounter-group therapy practiced in California's Esalen Institute, meditation and spiritual practices as valid avenues for self-actualization. The women's liberation movement also owes a debt to humanist psychologists, who pioneered techniques such as consciousness-raising--although Maslow expressed doubts about their goals. An illuminating cultural history.

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